117 The Royal Canadian Legion MANITOBA & NORTHWESTERN ONTARIO COMMAND www.mbnwo.ca LARENCE, Eugene Harry WWI Joe, John and Eugene (Harry) were the sons of Jim and Eleanor (Lagimodiere) Larence who came from St Laurent. Jim moved to Fisher Branch, Manitoba after the death of his wife in St-Ambroise in 1901. Harold, son of Harry Larence, served in World War II. Private Harry Larence enlisted in the 222nd Battalion Canada Canadian Expeditionary Force in St. Boniface, Manitoba on January 24, 1916. He took his basic training in St. Boniface and his advance training in Edmonton. While in Edmonton the renowned Father Lacombe, noted for his acts of kindness and good work among the natives, died. Pte. Larence was one of those chosen from the battalion to serve as guard of honour at Rev. Father Lacombe’s funeral. From Edmonton he was posted overseas and spent the first few months in England. He was then sent to France with the 24th Battalion, a French Battalion and from this point on he was at the front lines. His first battle was at Vimy Ridge in France. Here was fierce fighting. The day was Easter Monday, 1917 and there was a blinding snowstorm. When that battle was over only four came out of his outfit. He said that old Gaspar De La Ronde (Hodgson) was the only one to survive from his (Gaspar’s) unit. Passchendaele was the next point of battle. It was just a swamp that had been shelled over and over - it was just a floating bog. They had made walkways with wood and boards. If you fell off these, you would drown. The greatest fear of the soldiers at Passchendaele was if you got wounded there and fell off these walks you would sink in this slimy bog and drown. At Passchendaele he had a friend called Tom Roy, he was from McCreary. Tom had friends (two brothers) who were both killed in battle and Harry went to tell Tom. Also, that morning Harry had borrowed a razor strap from one of these brothers. He kept this razor strap and had it in his home in Fisher Branch. Many years later, Tom Roy came by plane to see him. Tom told him he would never forget when he came to tell him about his friends and he vowed he would see him again - he did - 44 years later. Quote “I fought in many battles, Ypres, Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele. Passchendaele was bloody and muddy. I advanced seeing bodies everywhere. Mud and stones were flying all around me. A shell would fall close to me - mud and stones would fly around but the shell would miss.” In the World War I, at the second battle of Ypres, there was only one cavalry attack. Harry witnessed this massacre. He was sitting on a little hill where he could watch - and it was just like watching a movie. The men and horses were just mowed down like grass. It was awful, nearly all were killed - horses and men. Really nobody came out of this battle - Officers, everyone was killed. At Arras in France, they were attacked with poisonous gas. The Germans opened hundreds of cylinders and you could see the gas drifting over no-man’s land and into the trenches. Men were dying like flies. Somebody told them that if you urinated on a piece of cloth and held it over your nose you could protect yourself from the gas. They tried this and Harry lived but suffered from the effects of the poisonous gas all his life. Quote “After one battle a bunch of German soldiers were captured. I was left to guard a small group (about 9) of these prisoners, while another soldier went for a truck to load them in. I heard a voice speak my name, saying ‘You don’t have to guard me with a rifle. I won’t run away – I’m a Canadian.’ This chap had migrated to Canada six years before war time. I had met him on the prairies at harvest time. Just before the war broke out, he had returned to Germany to visit his relatives. While there the German army conscripted him into the army, forcing him into the services, as his name was still on the German registry.” Quote “I remember Armistice Day. I was in an English hospital recovering from the flu.” Harry was returned to Canada in 1918 and was discharged to Montreal on May 18, 1919. He was given his fare back to Manitoba. He then returned to the farm at Fisher Branch. During World War II, Harry Larence was commissionaire at the Cordite Plant in Winnipeg and MacDonald’s Aircraft. He was a Life Member of The Royal Canadian Legion Branch 158 and was the only remaining World War I Veteran of this Legion until his death on January 28, 1990, at the age of 93. Until this time he had resided in Fisher Branch with Sadie, his wife of 68 years.
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